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Are you finding your loyalty program is lacking some pizazz? Are your customers signing up but only out of necessity, rather than excitement? Let’s explore how you can appeal to your customers with simple SMS based loyalty.

The loyalty industry is always changing but the main concept to keep in mind, is always focus on the wants and needs of your customer. Think to yourself, what makes you excited about a loyalty program? Do you love carrying cards around with you? Do you love filling in your details at a website, to sign up to a loyalty program? Probably not…so let’s jump in and see what SMS loyalty is all about.

Generation instant

A recent report by 3C revealed that Americans check their smartphones 8 billion times a day! So it is not a surprise that consumers are forcing this shift towards SMS, to connect with a store and its brand. An SMS based loyalty program means that customers are engaged with their points and rewards through txt message and also sent promotions through this channel. We are becoming a world of instant messaging, so you can imagine that receiving instant updates about how quickly you are eligible for rewards, can be very exciting! Interestingly The Disconnect 2016 report stated that 52% of consumers polled said mobile loyalty rewards & benefits motivated them to purchase more often. Now that’s some big stats.

Email vs. SMS based loyalty

Remember the days of loyalty programs where you handed over your email address and you were sent a million marketing emails. But you signed up to a loyalty program not marketing emails. Have you ever taken action on these marketing emails? This is maybe a good question to ask not only yourself but also your customers. It’s great to think that all of your customers are reading every email you send them but in reality they just want to be part of a loyalty program where they actually get rewarded. The numbers tell it all with almost 60% of consumers making more monthly visits/purchases because of a mobile enabled loyalty program. Remember it’s all about what the customer wants. Communicate with them in a way that they will respond – 48% of consumers prefer communications via SMS and text. Is it time for you to switch yet?

Digital vs. plastic

The benefits of running a digital loyalty program far outweighs the benefits of using paper or plastic cards. Mainly because gaining loyal customers is not the sole focus. Digital allows you to track increased customer spend, engaging customers using SMS promotions and separating a business from their competitors. Not only that but using a digital loyalty tool is so easy! A good digital loyalty solution allows staff members to sign customers up in seconds. This means customers are more inclined to take part of the program because they don’t have the chance of losing a paper card or having to register a plastic one.

Keeping up with technology

Technology is advancing and small to medium sized businesses are finding it hard to keep up due to a lack in resources. In fact, 65% of brand marketers say they either lack the IT resources for mobile loyalty integrations or admit they lack the knowledge on how to launch a mobile loyalty program (3C, 2016). So maybe it’s time for you to look at how an SMS based loyalty program can help your business. Click here to see how it works.

Suppose you are an independent merchant. You want a loyalty program because you want to get your regular customers spending more and you want to find a way of guaranteeing that spend by rewarding their loyalty. What do you do?

A lot of merchants consider plastic loyalty cards. This is a big mistake. An even bigger mistake than cardboard. The one thing to be said in favour of cardboard is that it is cheap. For a busy coffee shop or hair salon, handing out paper cards to all comers is no big deal. It costs them maybe £10 a month. If it’s a thriving business, they won’t notice the cost. Plastic is quite another matter. Read more